Starting with an awesome team get-together at Yosemite National Park and highlighted by the honor of winning an Apple Design Award, this past week was certainly one to remember for Agile Partners.

When Apple announced in April that WWDC 2010 would take place June 7-11 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, we immediately saw it as a must-attend event for Agile Partners. With the opportunity to learn more about the latest advancements in iOS technologies, take advantage of hands-on labs, and benefit from one-to-one interactions with Apple engineers, we knew WWDC 2010 would be an invaluable experience for our team as we continue to develop innovative applications for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch.

We kicked off our visit to northern California with a weekend get-together at Yosemite. The breathtaking views and tranquil trails (with an unexpected abundance of snow still on the ground) made Yosemite the perfect way to charge up for WWDC. To top it off, the talented chefs among the members of our team made sure everyone was well nourished with some incredibly tasty meals!

After driving from Yosemite back to San Francisco, our participation in WWDC started at 6:00 a.m. on Monday, June 7 as we lined up to attend Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ keynote address. The keynote address was filled with exciting announcements that culminated with the introduction of the new iPhone 4. Then, along with 5000 developers from around the world, we started digging into a wide variety of technical sessions and hands-on labs led by Apple engineers. Our team had come prepared with several questions related to our on-going projects and it was great to discuss them one-on-one with some of the 1000 Apple engineers attending WWDC.

The week was also packed with special events including awesome lunchtime presentations by speakers from Pixar, NASA and CNN. Evening activities included the perennially entertaining “Stump the Experts” Apple trivia event (hosted by some of the most knowledgeable and colorful Apple engineers you’ll ever meet) and the WWDC Bash at Yerba Buena Gardens with surprise musical guest, OK Go.

For our team, the highlight of the week occurred on Tuesday evening when Agile Partners was honored with a 2010 Apple Design Award for our TabToolkit for iPad app. We shared the stage with eight other developers whose applications also demonstrated technical excellence, innovation, superior technology adoption, high performance and outstanding design in the eyes of the Apple judges. It was a proud and humbling moment that inspired all of us at Agile Partners to keep working hard at continuously improving our craft.

We’re not a group that rests on our laurels — by now, we’ve all returned safely home and are preparing for some exciting days and weeks ahead. We’re at the beginning of Agile Partners’ most prolific period of product launches yet, with new products around the corner that we believe will delight our customers. Armed and energized by what we learned and experienced during the week of WWDC 2010, we’re ready to create many more memorable moments. Stay tuned!

I think it’s safe to say that this is one of the most exciting times ever at Agile Partners. TabToolkit for iPad (App Store link) just launched and is featured on the the App Store under “New and Noteworthy iPad Apps.”   We really believe TabToolkit will transform how people learn, practice and enjoy playing their favorite songs on guitar, piano, drums and other instruments.

Far more advanced than the basic sheet music viewers that simply display PDF or image files, TabToolkit is the only app that can smoothly render entire pages of crisp, engraved music in standard or tablature notation, on-the-fly.  You can see TabToolkit for iPad in action in this YouTube video.

We redesigned TabToolkit specifically for iPad to take full advantage of the unique features of the revolutionary device — the large display, Multi-Touch interface and incredible speed. It’s amazing how smoothly you can scroll through music with TabToolkit on iPad or jump to any point of a song by simply tapping or dragging the music on the screen. We think musicians will really enjoy viewing crisp, sharp music notation on the high resolution iPad screen.

Already one of the highest-rated music apps for iPhone, TabToolkit also enables users to listen to and control the audio of individual instrument tracks. Being able to control the audio of individual tracks makes it really fun to practice music with TabToolkit. For example, you can mute the guitar part of a song you’re learning while being guided by the bass, keyboard and drum parts playing in the background. It’s like you’re playing along with an entire band.

While other guitar tablature apps available for iPad and iPhone display only text tabs, TabToolkit fully supports “rich tabs” that include multiple instruments and the ability to hear an entire song performed. Similarly, while a few sheet music apps have appeared, these simply scroll static images or PDF pages. Because TabToolkit understands the underlying music, it accurately renders music on-the-fly in any notation, page size and orientation. TabToolkit also simultaneously renders perfectly synched multi-track audio for the song, including effects like guitar bends and slides.

TabToolkit supports text, PDF, Power Tab and Guitar Pro file formats (Power Tab and Guitar Pro files are required to experience TabToolkit’s full visual and audio capabilities). The app also has easy-to-use file upload and download features, enabling users to take their music with them wherever they go.

TabToolkit for iPad is already getting a lot of attention, particularly on Twitter. For example, @jimsylee tweeted “TabToolkit for iPad is looking veryyy nice”, @ayapejian said “TabToolkit looks great on the iPad, time to throw out all my printed guitar tabs – very happy!” and @gbevin said “TabToolkit for iPad looks mindblowing!!”  And the folks over at Mac|Life have already posted this TabToolkit for iPad article.

We’re proud that we’ve successfully tackled many tough challenges with TabToolkit, but what’s most important is that our customers enjoy our apps, find them useful and provide feedback to help us continuously improve them.  That’s Agile Partners’ commitment and what we’re focused on.

Just two days after its launch on the iTunes App Store, TabToolkit is already receiving rave reviews from guitar enthusiasts, major media writers, mobile tech bloggers, and most importantly to all of us here at Agile Partners, our customers. These reviews have helped propel TabToolkit to the #30 position on the Top Paid Apps list in the iTunes App Store Music category (as of this writing).

When TabToolkit launched two days ago, Dave at fretbase.com wrote, “Just like GuitarToolkit, we love TabToolkit because it does exactly what it claims it will do … when you load your Power Tab and Guitar Pro tabs, TabToolkit makes you feel like you have been transported into the future.” Dave continues to say, “We think it is well worth its price of $9.99 and a must have for all guitar players who play with tablature.” Travis Ehrlich at geardiary.com wrote yesterday, “Agile Partners have really outdone themselves with this app! TabToolkit is attractive, easy to use and fast … this is a quality app!”

Matt Rosoff at cnet’s Digital Noise blogged, “…a very sophisticated app that performs well — no freezes or stutters, as I’ve experienced with other music-oriented apps.” TabToolkit was named a Cult of Mac Favorite by Lonnie Lazar, who also commented, “I can say without reservation that Agile Partners have created an incredibly useful, well-thought-out app.”

TabToolkit has also captured the attention of mobile technology bloggers. Over at thismobilelife.com, the headline was, “TabToolkit: The Guitarist’s NEW Best Friend!” At TotalApps.com, David Kint wrote, “If you had asked me two weeks ago if I ever thought such a multi-featured application would run on an iPhone or even be possible I would have had serious doubts. Yet, here it is. If you own a guitar and an iPhone then the TabToolkit and GuitarToolkit are two essential applications you really must own.” Palm Sounds featured the TabToolkit video.

Finally, we’re fortunate to have received incredible feedback from TabToolkit customers around the world. JackHarteveld in the UK wrote, “This is a fantastic app, definitely worth the price! A clean, easy way to take tabs with you, with the added bonus of letting the device play the songs out for you! A great companion to GuitarToolkit and a highly polished app; an easy recommendation for guitarists.” NickMaher in Australia wrote, “Very polished application, well worth the money” and Vab-1971 in Belgium said, “Application très soignée, un vrai régal.” I’m not entirely sure what that last comment says, but it  came with a five-star rating!

Thank you to all the writers who reviewed TabToolkit in the first two days of its launch, and a special thanks to TabToolkit customers around the world for providing us with your comments and feedback.  Please keep it coming — we’re dedicated to enhancing TabToolkit and all our products, and keeping our customers happy!

We’re thrilled to announce TabToolkit (App Store link), our latest app for musicians. A perfect companion to GuitarToolkit, TabToolkit is a highly advanced tablature player for the iPhone and iPod touch. It’s a great tool for learning new songs and practicing exercises.

If you’re unfamiliar with what a tablature (or tab) file is, it’s a simplified form of music notation that started out for guitar music, but has expanded over the years to enable the creation of complete music compositions. Wikipedia entry for tablature

TabToolkit was a significant technical challenge in a number of ways. By rendering out music notation in realtime and coupling it with synthesized instrument output, we feel like we’re really expanding the capabilities of the platform. We initially planned on launching 1.0 without synthesized audio, but after hearing a prototype implementation work for the first time, we realized we just had to do it.

Creatively, there were plenty of hurdles to overcome as well. We had to create our own font for the music notation display. The combination of Adobe’s licensing options and the lack of good, freely available music notation fonts made creating our own the most compelling option.

A few of the features in TabToolkit:

• Support for the following tab formats: Guitar Pro, Power Tab, text and PDF *
• Audio synthesizer allows you to hear the instrument being played
• View both standard music notation and tablature notation
• Automatically scroll through music with tempo control
• Turn on a metronome with a wide range of sounds
• Select from multiple instrument tracks
• Display a fretboard (guitar or bass) or keyboard that shows finger positions
• Upload tab files directly from your Mac or PC
• Download tabs from the Internet using the built-in web browser
• Portrait and landscape orientations for viewing while docked or on a music stand
• Built-in help, news and feedback support features
• Lefties welcome! Lefty-mode inverts the fretboard to display correct finger positions

* Instrument audio, metronome, auto-playback, music notation and multiple tracks are suppported for Guitar Pro and Power Tab files

Buy it in the App Store or visit the TabToolkit page to learn more.